Just Breathe In
by Shelbo
Summary: 1971 version. What happens to Veruca after she is announce a bad egg and goes sliding down the garbage chute? Why, counselling of course! All this leads up to her spending time in the Whack Shack and her father making a heart-breaking outburst. R&R Please
1. Sit Down, Sweetheart

**Author's Note**: I do not own any of the characters except for the doctors, nurses, and other medical folk. Everyone else is copyright to Roald Dahl; the writer of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. However, I do own a dog-earred copy of the book and I have the 1971 movie on DVD.

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**Chapter One: "Just Sit Down, Sweetheart"**

The sun shone brightly through the blinds of the window of Dr. Marvin's office. It was a Monday, a dreaded day to all; kids **AND** adults. Dr. Marvin's secretary sat in her chair, talking to a client on the phone.

"Mhm? You want to schedule an appointment with Dr. Marvin for your mother? What time exactly, sir? YOU'RE A MISSUS?! I'm terribly sorry, madame. Has your mother been diagnosed with any mental problems? Schizophenia, you say? Alrighty then, Mrs. Mulch, bring your mother in next Friday at eight-o'-clock. Yes, A.M, silly! We close at 5:30 P.M.

This is how it was working in a therapist's office, and how it had been for ten years of the secretary's life. She was a young woman, thirty at the least. Her hair was short and blonde and she had her sunglasses perched on her brow of yellow curls. She hung the phone up and looked around the lobby. In an alcove, was the waiting room, with only a meager handful of people waiting to see the charismatic therapist who lie beyond the door in the back of the room. Soon, more people would walk in and join, but the secretary had more things to worry over than this. She went back to writing prescriptions for a toddler boy who was seriously ill with bipolar disorder. A noise went off: signalling the arrival of new patients. The secretary looked up.

"Daddy, I don't _want_ to come here," whinned an teenaged girl in a red dress with black buttons that ran down the middle and ended above a black belt. Below the licorice black belt was a red skirt and white tights. The girl had short, dirty blonde hair and had almond-shaped blue eyes that shone with not sweetness or calmness like most would expect out of the blue eyes of a child, but with boiling anger and rage.

"Sorry, Ruci," said the short beefy man who followed her. He was taller than his daughter by only half an inch.

The girl shouted, "I _want_ to go home, I _want_ to go swimming in the indoor pool, _NOW_!"

The whole waiting room had the father and daughter's attention now.

The man whispered in the child's ear, "No, Veruca, your mother and I think it's for the best that you have...er..._guidance_."

Veruca's jaw flung down, "I beg your pardon, Daddy, but I am **completely** sane."

The secretary forcefully beamed, "Hello, kind sir and madame, are you here for an appointment?"

Veruca screeched, "**WHAT DOES IT LOOK LIKE!?**"

A man waiting in the alcove sniggered. _Completely sane indeed!_

"Erm," Veruca's father said, "The patient is Veruca Salt, she is here to be diagnosed. I'm her father...OUCH! VERUCA! DON'T KICK DADDY IN HIS PAINFUL SPOT WHILST HE IS TALKING!" Veruca stuck her tongue out at him, but he went on to finish his sentence, "...Henry Salt." He walked away from the desk, grabbed hold of Veruca's hand and led her to the waiting room.

"Now Veruca," Mr. Salt lovingly chided, "You were acting very much like a bad egg up there."

"FAH!" shouted the loud, obnoxoius little girl. "See if I care." She took a magazine and began reading it while standing next to her father, who was slumped down in his chair embarressed. She paged through the magazine with a pouty expression on her little face.

"Ruci," said her father sternly, "Please sit down, sweetheart."

Veruca rolled her eyes and plopped down in the chair next to her father, pout still upon her face. Mr. Salt had just took notice of it.

"Veruca!" he said hysterically, "Wipe that look off your face right now!"

Veruca yelled at him, "NO! You don't tell what to do, I am better than you because I have hair! WHICH MAKES ME RADIANT! LIKE A ROMAN GODDESS OR SOMETHING!" She threw the magazine she was reading at the little man and slapped him upside his bald head, "You always make things difficult." She got up and moved to another chair in the alcove.

Mr. Salt never got another chance to talk to his daughter during the whole time they were waiting for Dr. Marvin, due to the fact he presented himself only five minutes after their little spat.

Dr. Phil Marvin was the kind of man people hoped to be once they hit their late fourties: wealthy, wise, powerful, and not to mention good-looking. He walked into the lobby with much applause. He looked down at his clipboard filled with the names of his patients today._ Veruca Salt_. Hmmmm, isn't that what you sprinkle on your foot to kill warts? Ah well, it says here that her father is that guy who runs Salt Peanut Co., so he must pay well.

"Miss Veruca Salt?"

Veruca dusted off her skirt, "Here I am, Doctor!" She got up and walked out of the alcove; glaring at her father who shrunk with fear and embarressment.

"Hello, dear," said Marvin. "I'm Doctor Marvin and I'll be your therapist." His dark green compassionate eyes searched for a loving glow in the teen's eyes, but couldn't find any.

This was going to be hell.


	2. Beelzeebub Salt

**Author's Note**: Yes, I'm aware that Veruca's favorite dress was destroyed as she went down the garbage chute, but what if Henry caved in and bought her a new one exactly like it?

Chapter Two: Beelzeebub Salt

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Dr. Marvin led Veruca into a small room with a coach only five feet away from the wall in the back of the room; practically in the center of the room, just not quite. Shelves filled the room, each holding books and toys and the like. Dr. Marvin beckoned her to sit down on the coach with him. Rolling her eyes the way she did when anyone told her to do something, she sat down.

"So, what brings you here on this fine afternoon?" the man asked looking deep into her satanic blue eyes.

"Daddy says I'm a maniac and I am **not**!"

"Well, Miss Veruca," the therapist said wryly. "Your performance in the waiting room proved alot of things to me."

Veruca froze.

"You saw _that_, Doc?"

Marvin nodded.

Veruca snarled and began her story of her coming here.

"I always get what I want when I want, but I've had a recent little problem. You probably know me as the second finder of the Golden Ticket to Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory. Anyway, Daddy and I went to that bloomin' place and all the sudden kids were disappearing like rabbit: either falling in Chocolate rivers or turning into blueberries. This one kid...what's his name, what's his name?...Mike became really small and had to be stretched out with a taffy puller."

Veruca didn't expect Dr. Marvin to believe any of this, but she knew he probably heard crazier things which were not true.

Dr. Marvin cocked an eyebrow, "_Taffy puller_?"

Veruca nodded and continued, "But I, on the other hand, decided I wanted the geese that lay the golden eggs, so I pleaded for Daddy to give it to me, but Mr. Wonka wouldn't sell it. I tried and tried to butter the two of them up, and I swear to God that Wonka is a stubborn jerk! I got on top of this thing called the Eggdicator to emphasize my longing for the goose, but I fell in and went down the garbage chute!"

Dr. Marvin continued jotting things down on his notepad, "_Eggdicator...goose...fell...garbage chute_."

"Luckily, just as I felt the blistering heat of the furnace, Daddy reached me and pulled me out of the pipes. He was very, very furious with me and called me mean names like 'brat', 'snob', and 'muniplulative child'. **I'M NONE OF THOSE**!! And in the end that fool Charlie Bucket won the prize, but he stole the fizzy lifting drinks, I saw him!"

Dr. Marvin said after she finished her narrative, "Okay...and do you have any hobbies?"

Veruca jumped back. She had none except to complain and scream, but she couldn't tell the therapist that. "Erm...drawing," she lied.

The man smiled, "Oh, that's nice, dear. I remember when I was your age, all the ten year olds loved drawing dearly."

Veruca screeched, "**I'M THIRTEEN, NOT TEN**!!"

Dr. Marvin frowned, embarressed, "Sorry, Miss Salt."

Veruca sighed rudely.

"Do you have any friends, Veruca?"

"I don't make _friends_ with poor people."

"Do you have any pets?"

"A managerie."

"Does a pretty one like you have a boyfriend?"

"YOU'RE A SICKO!"

"Do you listen to music, ma'am?"

"Do you spend your nerdy nights listening to ragtime from the fifties?"

Dr. Marvin guffawed and scuffled her hair, "Silly, ragtime is from the fourties!" He had to admit, Veruca Salt was going to be the hardest patient he ever dealt with. Maybe not, considering he had dealt with brats before, many of them older than this mere child, and came out victorious. Yet this one seemed like the Devil's disciple, Beezleboss.

Veruca grunted, "Can we go now, is it over? I _want _to leave!" She got up from the coach and stomped her way to the door. Daddy will hear about this, she thought. Just as she had touched the brass doorknob and began to turn it; Mr. Marvin called out to the rude girl.

"Veruca...wait. I have something for you." Veruca turned her golden head to see what lie on the man's palm. Sure enough, it was a Wonka Bar like the one she'd gotten her Golden Ticket out of. She scurried over to get it. She didn't say please or thank you or anything, she just took the bar and began devouring it.

Dr. Marvin smiled cockily, "I knew you'd like it, Veruca. I know you like chocolate, even though you would easily have said no to it."

Veruca had now eaten 3/4 of the bar when she looked up at him, "Yeah, I love chocolate." Then, she went back to her munching. The doctor couldn't help but laugh at the childish greed and pleasure that shone in the girls eyes, her loud smacking, and most of all the brown smudges smeared around her mouth. She was a charming (but selfish brat) girl. If only he, too, were thirteen.

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**Sorry for the shortness. Also, I'm aware that Julie Dawn Cole who played Veruca didn't like chocolate, but I thought the chocolate bit would be interesting and would lure Veruca to Dr. Marvin.**


End file.
